DeLong Smackdown Watch Smackdown Watch: The Deficit Hawks of OMB as Vote Counters

Hoisted from Comments: Robert Waldmann writes:

DeLong has been duly smacked down, but I'm not sure your correspondents have proven that you were unfair to the deficit hawks at the OMB. Your revision suggests "Battered but Not and Beaten" was more than fair to them.

The center block in the Senate just voted against cloture on a bill to extend only tax cuts on family income under $250,000. They did not do so, because the Baucus bill would add trillions to the 10 year deficit. They did so because it wouldn't add additional hundreds of billions (I submit that Russ Feingold is not a member of the center block).

When it's time to vote, they demonstrated that they don't give a damn about the deficit. Also OMB staffers are supposed to know about managment of budgets. They should be cautious when claiming they understand how to manage Senators. Pretending that they can communicate with Ben Nelson is like pretending that they can communicate with the dead. It isn't plausible, and they are likely to end up looking like fools.

The above paragraph should not be construed as suggesting that I believe that the honorable Senator Nelson is brain dead.